How to Build and Install Hive Keychain for Firefox

Hive Keychain is the Hive Blockchain's version of Steem Keychain developed by the same people. Hive Keychain is very much under active development, and not available through Chrome Store or Firefox Addons yet.

In Chrome, we can load unpacked extension that will persist even after restarts. But in Firefox we can only load it in debugging mode, which won't persist after restarts.

It is a problem because every time you restart your browser, you have to go through the same process of adding the extension and adding all your accounts.

Let's see how you can build and install the extension as you have downloaded from the Addons store.

Requirements

Node JS Installation

Install web-ext

web-ext is an NPM module by Mozilla which will help us sign and build the extension. Install it globally using the following command.

npm install --global web-ext

This command should install web-ext globally so you'll be able to use it from anywhere. Open up command prompt and type web-ext --version to verify the installation.

Get API Keys

Visit Mozilla Add-ons Developers page to get your API keys. If you do not have an account, you need to register one and create API keys. You'll be given two pieces of information- JWT issuer and JWT secret. Both of them are needed to sign the extension. API keys are very sensitive information, so do not share them.

Downloading Source Code and Building

Go to hive branch of Hive Keychain's source code and download it. Extract the Zip file into your computer, and head over to the folder, it may be called hive-keychain-hive.

Open up command prompt or Terminal in that folder and type the following command and press Enter.

web-ext sign --api-key YOUR_JWT_USER --api-secret YOUR_JWT_SECRET

The processing will take some time. web-ext will validate, sign the extension.

When it is done, it will save a .xpi file for you in the web-ext-artifacts folder inside the hive-keychain-hive folder.

Installing The Extension

From Firefox's menu, head over to Addons. Click the Gear icon on the right, then select Install Add-on From File, then select the .xpi the file we have just generated. Hive Keychain will be installed and ready to use right away.